The present invention relates to devices for retrieving tennis balls, and, in particular, a tennis ball retriever and storage cart having a spring assisted retrieval capability and roller supported travel capability.
During practice for sporting activities such as golf and tennis, a large number of balls are hit in an effort to improve skill levels. Periodically, the balls must be retrieved and various designs have been used to simplify the retrieval, as wells as providing a storage receptacle for the balls. Typical conventional retrieval and storage units are disclosed in U.S. Pat. No. 3,371,950 to Stap, U.S. Pat. No. 3,820,836 to Seewagen et al. and U.S. Pat. No. 4,811,980 to Ferrari et al.
The units comprise a rectangular receptacle comprised of spaced small diameter wires forming an enclosure cage for the balls. To aid in the retrieval of the ball, the base of the cage includes a plurality of laterally spaced base bars. Adjacent base bars are spaced a distance slightly less than the diameter of the standard tennis ball. Individual balls are retrieved by lifting the cage over the ball with the base bars straddling opposite sides of the ball. As the cage is lowered, the ball is locally compressed. As the ball passes over center, the resilient compression of the ball reestablishes the spherical shape forcing the ball upwardly into the storage receptacle, commingled with other retrieved balls.
While readily and conveniently useable for retrieving, the units must be physically lifted and carried to the site of each ball. Considerable distances are traversed in reaching the generally randomly distributed retrieval locations, and as the receptacle fills it becomes heavy and increasingly laborious to lift and move. In an effort to ease the effort in horizontally transporting the units, fixed support wheels have been proposed as disclosed in U.S. Pat. No. 4,461,504 to Perez et al. The wheels ease the transporting of the unit between ball locations, however, at each ball site, the cage must be physically raised and positioned over the ball.
The present invention retains the simplicity and each of operation of the prior retrieval and storage units while providing a rolling unit that may be readily transported on wheels between ball locations, positioned appropriately over the target ball without requiring lifting, and manually lowered against resilient resistance to capture automatically the balls within the receptacle. The foregoing features are accomplished by supporting the cage on spring biased swivel wheels that normally space the base above the height of the ball, allowing the receptacle to be rolled into a location wherein the capturing base bars are appropriately disposed for capture. To retrieve the target ball, the operator downwardly depresses the cage against the resistance of the spring suspension to pick up the ball in a conventional manner.
Accordingly, it is an object of the present invention to provide a retrieval unit for sporting balls that may be transported to select locations without lifting.
A further object of the invention is to provide a tennis ball retrieval and storage unit that is moved without lifting between locations and shifted downwardly from a normal support position to retrieve the ball.
Another object of the invention is to provide a tennis ball retrieval unit having swivel wheels that allow transporting without lifting between locations, and a spring suspension that is manually depressed to effect capture and loading of the ball.